The King George County School Board and the board of supervisors voted separately this week to place a nonbinding bond referendum on the November ballot asking citizens if they support spending up to $57 million on a PreK-5 elementary school.
The school board voted to do so reluctantly after Superintendent Jesse Boyd was informed by board of supervisors Interim County Attorney Richard Stuart that the school board needed to request the referendum first before the supervisors could begin the process of putting it on the ballot.
The board of supervisors’ vote was unanimous, while the school board split, 3-2, with no one speaking strongly in favor of the resolution supporting the referendum.
School Board Chair David Bush and board member Ed Frank voted against the resolution, with Frank stating that, “if we are playing politics here, we’re playing it with some of the most vulnerable kids out there.”
“I am not for this at all, and the reason why I guess is so often as elected officials, we need to make the best decision that we can, and we were elected to make those decisions,” Bush said. “There are so many decisions that we make that don’t necessarily require we go out to the larger community and get their opinion because we have the information to make those decisions.”
Bush said, in his opinion, the supervisors will be in an unenviable position if residents vote against the referendum, stating that regardless of the outcome, more elementary school space is required.
Boyd gave a presentation that demonstrated that Sealston Elementary School is expected to be 1% over capacity when school opens next month, while King George Elementary School is at 91% capacity. Boyd provided the information in response to Supervisor Ken Stroud stating — as a citizen — during the school board meeting that he hasn’t observed an increase in school-aged children in the county, and thus there’s no need for additional space.
“Unless maybe they’re coming across the border, where is the demand signal that requires a new school?” Stroud said.
The new school would be at 8562 Dahlgren Road, replacing the old middle school. The question on the ballot in November will read as follows: “Shall King George County, Virginia contract a debt and issue its general obligation bonds in the maximum principal amount of Fifty-Seven Million Dollars ($57,000,000) pursuant to the Public Finance Act of 1991, as amended, for the purpose of financing of the costs of the acquisition, design, construction and equipping of a new pre-K-5th grade elementary school, that will serve the residents and students of King George County?”
Bush is concerned that there are no town halls or other gatherings scheduled besides school board meetings to inform the public about the need for a new school.
“I don’t like the idea of voting on something without having the knowledge of what’s going on,” Bush said. “I’m afraid that if the residents of the county vote on a referendum of $50 million you’re going to have a lot of thoughts and them not having the information to really to be able to vote on those kinds of things.”
